


Live

by ledbythreads



Series: Heart in your hand [12]
Category: Jimmy Page - Fandom, Led Zeppelin, Robert Plant - Fandom, Rock Music RPF
Genre: 1985, Angst and Feels, Backstage, Canon Compliant, Canon Timeline, Complicated Relationships, Established Relationship, Ficlet, Heartache, Heartbreak, I watched it for the first time today and wrote this, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Live Aid, M/M, One Shot, Phil is not in it otherwise I'd have rated for horror ok I know that is not fair, References to Philbert, Robert has a solo career, True Love, as he keeps reminding everyone, hanging by a thread, post-zep, rockfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:26:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27479524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ledbythreads/pseuds/ledbythreads
Summary: A story about backstage after Live Aid. Don't be scared. They played better than their relationship at this point. There be angst. And dragons. Dazed and confused dragons. And a lion-heart man who still loves him.
Relationships: Jimmy Page/Robert Plant
Series: Heart in your hand [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1523687
Comments: 14
Kudos: 33





	Live

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thebookhunter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebookhunter/gifts).



… _he wants to pull that sweaty scrawny jumpy cat thing into his lap but he knows he can’t and has to wait and fuck homophobia and fuck jimmy being a mess and fuck he wants him so much and wants to feel him against his chest and feel him go limp and kiss the sweat off his neck and kiss his stupid mouth to shut him up and hold him loosely till he can take more and slide down his belly till he’s making sounds half way between sobbing and pleading and then make him come just because of how in the ten minutes after he actually feels how much Robert still loves him before his anxiety clouds it all once again._

They are asking another question. Robert says anything. Says nothing. Watches Jimmy. 

This ache is so familiar. Jimmy doesn’t even know where he is, Robert thinks. Except he knows he is with me. He still knows.

The nowhere place. This cold room. Jimmy’s hot body against the breezeblock wall. Grey industrial stadium. The part nobody sees. Like Jimmy’s eyes now. Unfocused. Sloppy half smile. Jimmy turns his face into Robert’s palm and all the bitterness runs out of him like the dregs at the bottom of an upended whisky glass.

“The balance was off… Baby. I… I couldn’t always… feel you. Couldn’t feel you.”

His breath is sour, but Robert kisses him anyway. Cold sweat despite the change of shirt. Soon he will be shaking with it. Not yet. Still high like cheap cola and styrofoam black coffee before the lights go up. Jimmy holding his hand, tight in the dark. All those times. Not today.

Jimmy isn’t kissing back. Robert pulls away.

“Was it bad? Robert…”

“Hush. No honey.”

Jimmy’s eyes go wide in fear but then cloud over again. He’s whispering now.

“Did I, what did I, did I say anything… wrong?”

He clutches at Robert and hides his face in the crook of his neck, like Logan used to. Like both his sons. This is not what Robert imagined when he dragged them here. A harsh hand on Jimmy’s wrist. Making him giggle, uncomprehending. A quick fuck. A small victory over frustration.

His throat is raw and not just from singing memory songs. Of course it was bad. Because they’d been bad. Arguing and bitching in the trailers so that Jimmy just kept on drinking down his disappointment. Robert had finally agreed to sing the fucking thing while Jimmy could still stand. Ninety thousand people who were impossible to disappoint, because all they wanted was to say they had seen Led Zeppelin play Stairway, whether they were listening or not. Seeing or not. They never see.

Jimmy is snuffling in that place just at the hollow of Robert’s jaw. The place he always used to kiss so softly. Teasing, butterfly kisses, so he never left a mark, while simultaneously he purposely left the imprint of each finger, distinctly, on the inside of Robert’s thighs. Jimmy is fumbling with his belt. The warmth of Robert’s body triggering some sort of automatic response in him. In the same way kittens will paw at anything that reminds them of their mother’s belly.

“Jimmy… mate. Jimmy, you’re too out of it … for that. Jimmy.”

“Ask me…”

He could. He could get Jimmy on his knees. He could fuck him hard with his face pressed to the wall. He could bend him over one of those flight cases belonging to some unknown band and bury his face in the cleft of Jimmy’s ass till he is calling Robert’s name over and over and over. Till he is wordless and open and sorry.

Jimmy can play a halfway decent solo when he’s too far gone to speak in full sentences, but he is defeated by a button. Robert has nothing to say. He is tired of talking for Jimmy so the world won’t see the state he is in. He is tired of fighting. Tired of being the bright one. Tired of running.

“Hush now. Come on.”

“Are you fucking him?”

“No. Come on now. Honey. Come here.”

“Acts like he owns you.”

“He’s been good to me.”

“Not like me.”

“Not like you.”

“Ask me.”

A murmur now.

“Later.”

“Isn’t a later.”

“There’s always a later. I said so, didn’t I?”

Robert pulls them to the floor and pulls Jimmy into his lap. Cradles him. Rocks him.

“Take me home.”

“We’re in America, Jimmylove. In Philly”

“ _Can you take me to a movie, will you take me to a show, will you be…_ ”

He trails off. When Jimmy’s breathing is slow and steady Robert sits there. Legs going dead under him.

“Of course I will.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The part nobody sees](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28263816) by [mary_anjel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mary_anjel/pseuds/mary_anjel)




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